Wednesday, December 13, 2017

I knew it was going to be a bad week when two different
light bulbs burned out the same day, taking out both my desk lamps. As they lay there alongside each other in the
trash can the twin dead light bulbs kind of spoke to me; so what follows is
part explanation & part translation
of that message.

My PTSD frequently keeps
me up all night these days; there is a feeling in the air that something is
about to happen and I somehow need to bear witness when it goes down, so I'm
back in news hawk mode. I can feel it out there, like some unseen
predator about to pounce on unsuspecting prey...

I didn't have long to wait...It was the recent shootings in Red Bluff, California. I know a few
people in that community and it's where my best friends call home.

Everywhere it's just guns, guns, guns. We are swamped and inundated with the details
of so many shootings every single day we have to numb ourselves to it lest it
incapacitate us. America
has become a shooting gallery carnival ride, and its just another part of the
grand scheme to lock us into a fascist dictatorship once and for all. Senseless
random shootings are increasing almost as if by design, it's part of a larger
plan intended to take "us" our of the equation. Just one of several pacification technologies currently being used on citizens around
the planet.

Have you noticed that the future isn't being built, it's
being destroyed? Everywhere we look all
we can see are decaying systems falling apart.
We see "wars and rumors of wars;" &
we're seeing still greater chaos coming at us as the captains of industry
continue poisoning the environment unabated.

Psychopaths &
sociopaths are having a field day, whether stalking their prey in our
neighborhoods, or the halls of government; they seem to all have the immunity
idol and never seem to get voted off the island.

We are five years into this age of Aquarius paradigm and
finding ourselves seeing and dealing with the death throes of the Kali
Yuga.

Wherever greed and lust for power have enjoyed their time at
the top; they are now falling in upon themselves and clawing for survival. You can see it every day. Not only is their day in the sun coming to an
abrupt end; they don't know how to stop it or fix it. They don't even know that they can't stop it.

To
Get Along, Go Along

Take for example increasing number of powerful men being
outed and losing their career over sexual misconduct and worse. There's a new one almost every day. Whether its the entertainment industry,
politics; the houses of government or the world of business & finance.
There is even a urophiliac sexual
predator/rapist in the white house oval office who has over 15
female accusers, and his day too, will arrive when he must answer for
his wrongdoings.

"When you're a star they let you do it;

you
can do anything,

Grab
'em by the pussy"

~ Donald Trump ~

Trump is the quintessential schoolyard bully, being that; to
conceal his many flaws and insecurities; and I suspect it is the same with all
male sexual predators. Trump is so typical of those who feel privileged above and beyond the rest of us. I wonder if he is aware that the way his face contorts when he is pleased makes him look like he drank a glass of mad hatter bladder splatter?

This mindset of sexual abuse has been ingrained in our
business, politics & government for so
many decades, as just an extension of the domination of women in our
culture.

Look at all the products that depend on exploiting scantily
clad sexy women to sell, and nobody seems to care much about how that influences our male dominated
culture. What do you suppose are the
subliminal messages young boys &
girls are getting from hyper-sexy commercials?

Sexual harassment in politics is so rampant that female
staffers at the white house and senate have long had an informal "creep list" of over 50 politicians to avoid being around. To
say that sexual misconduct is rampant in the halls of American politics is not
an exaggeration; our history is full of it but let's just look at some prime
examples like Ted Kennedy (Google: Chappaquiddick ), Senator Bob
Packwood, Anthony Wiener, a whole separate list of men who predate on young
boys and of course our last vice president Joe Biden who has a long
history (with photos) of very inappropriate touching, groping, and general
all-around creepiness. The reason he was
never publicly accused, humiliated and fired is because he was never in a
position of any real power.

We kind of expect
it when some vile politician gets busted for being a sexual predator; but it's
a different story when one your favorite actors, singers or role models turns
out to just be another creep. Puts us
into re-evaluation mode. In the two
months since the Harvey Weinstein story broke there have been multiple
accusations levied against another 18 men in politics and entertainment,
including Matt Lauer of ABC news.

We have predatory business practices, predatory banking & predatory marketing

so why get upset over a few sexual predators to round out
society to the least common denominator?
It is simply amazing what we get used to, and what we allow to pass for
normal; and it is what sickens the soul into a spiritual depression nearly
impossible to reason ourselves out of. So
we do our best not to think of it.

Don't
Rock the Boat

It's almost as if the Harvey Weinstein story hit at exactly
the right time to cause the flood of other predators being outed in the bright
light of day, watch them as they squirm like the vampires they are. This is not just a weird coincidence or
synchronicity, as I said previously this is the end of the Kali Yuga, the
falling down time for the Piscean age; and mark my words, we're soon going to
see more
of these cascading revelations as one after another, the old paradigms crumble
beneath the gravity of their own corruption.

Another example of how the old paradigms are dying and
falling is when the people of Alabama
decided on the side of decency by rejecting [by a narrow margin] pedophile Judge Roy Moore's run for the US
Senate. Sending a sexual predator of young
girls to the senate when others were being forced out for lesser [but equally unacceptable] misconduct was just too much.

I was astounded to see so many Alabama
residents interviewed who didn't have a problem with Moore's
attractions to their underage daughters.
Can't help but wonder if Roy's
supporters would be so supportive had he been after their teenage sons instead.

Unfortunately it will
be some time yet before we can start dancing in the streets to celebrate
the fall of the system, we still have
to survive until the downfall
is complete, and what comes after. there
will be more mayhem, more chaos as the dying paradigms try to take us all down
with them. Bless them, then release
them, but do not get caught up in their devious mind games and doublespeak.

We're in dystopian time now, where cognitive dissonance & Cassandra syndrome call the shots. Feelings of powerlessness pervade as the
majority of us sleepwalk thru life with the mentality of a battered housewife,
unable & unwilling to find our own
voice for fear of losing what little we have left.

Why is it that the one thing most endangering the future of
every living human is the one thing nobody wants to talk about? It wasn't mentioned even once during the entire 2016 presidential campaign. It is never mentioned in the "news"
media despite being the most important story in modern times, perhaps
ever. Doesn't that strike you as being
disturbingly odd? We intentionally
exclude the subject of Fukushima
from our stream of consciousness because we know we can do nothing about
it. Thinking about things we're
powerless over brings a certain kind of
stress to the soul, not so much the mind ...if only stupidity was painful and
radiation was visible; we would be living in
a much different world than this one.

I was 14 years old in 1963 when Buddhist priest Thich Quang
Duc set himself on fire in Saigon to protest the
communist takeover of his country. That
level of total commitment made a most indelible impression on my young mind. As I watched it on live TV the purity of his
soul moved me, and no doubt helped shape the person I became.

We just don't see that
level of commitment to anything these days, I guess
its gone out of style. Maybe it just
takes more than that to shake us awake from our slumber nowadays. How about you, is there anything so offensive
to your soul that you'd burn yourself alive to protest it, to try to force
change?

So we come back around to those two burned out light bulbs in my trash can, we're
losing light... we're going backwards
into depravity instead of forward into enlightenment. We're insanely still
trying to power our planet with a finite supply of oil from the ground; when we
should be using the infinite supply of solar power.

I'm so tired of this
consensus reality that seems only to produce people who are impervious to
reason and strangers to empathy. So
tired of the willful blindness to effects and legacy from Fukushima
generations from now.

At the recent Thanksgiving dinner table, after the main course,
conversation turned toward the recent wildfires; and how grateful we were to
have been missed by the flames. We
talked about how total strangers were laying everything on the line to help
people they didn't know. Then someone
asked, "Why aren't we that way all the time?" Pretty interesting question, don't you think?

On any given day its just as likely the same people being
heroes one day would have run you off the road the day before. We have become distrustful, disdainful and
intolerant of our own species, in all it's many forms: unless they're injured or in harm's way, it seems the only time we
consider their souls.

But drop a decent emergency or disaster on us, no matter how
nasty and we rise to the occasion, and become our brothers keeper. Why only then? What gives?
Why would it be so hard to just be that way all the time?

So here we are in the land of 200 dollar blue jeans and
restaurants so expensive the food eats you.
While it keeps our focus
upon the eternal rat race, beneath our notice &
concern, the system literally drowns
our children with all forms of violence in all forms of entertainment media; so
they'll consider it as being normal
in real life. Conditioned and
programmed.

We shouldn't be living this way, and we know that. But who stands up to change it?

What specifically &
exactly is wrong with us?

T'is the season as they say, when our hearts and minds are
filled with peace on earth and good will toward men. Why just a few days at the end of every year,
instead of all the time? Isn't it just
pretending, if we only think spiritually at the appointed times? Aren't we all just pretending when we know
life isn't supposed to be this way, but silently partake in it anyway?

Those of us who have been playing midwife trying to help kick
start the age of Aquarius

have been at it for a long time, all the while understanding
we're dealing with cosmic changes which move at glacial speed. It hurts our souls to see the many atrocities
being carried out as the old ways die and the new world emerges from the ashes
like a phoenix. It brings a certain world
weariness the Germans call Welt Schmerz,a kind ofsentimental pessimism that leaves us
fearing for the future.

Mayhem surrounds us with police killings of black youth
without punishment, spree killers, serial killers, the on-going street
executions of policemen. Something is
wrong with our society, it's been wrong for so long that we are lost when we
try to deal with it rationally. (you
can't) It's an affliction of the
soul that we become acclimated to, and that is the source of the
spiritual depression that has a death grip on joy, peace and happiness. Still more horrifying is the sure knowledge
that the world our children inherit from us will be all the worse for our
unwillingness to dismantle the system.

Just this week I watched two different, unrelated videos of
policemen killing unarmed black men. One
was the shooting of Walter Scott by Michael Slager who emptied his gun into
Scott's back as the youth ran away. The
other video was from a recent incident in San Francisco
where a rookie cop murdered a black man who was on hands & knees begging not
to be shot, the rookie killed him anyway.
Former officer Slager is going to jail for 20 years, but the rookie got
off, his shooting ruled as "good".
The message this sends to cops is simple, shoot on sight, Just don't
shoot them in the back.

I sometimes enjoy watching Stephen Colbert's late show, and
especially so after another recent shooting event. He used a tiger as analogy for this epidemic
of public shootings happening weekly across this country. He asks wouldn't we band together as a
village to figure out a way to end the violence if a tiger was attacking it
every week or so? Yes, we might defend
ourselves somehow, or maybe some other remedy; but we wouldn't just continue to
sit silent and still watching the carnage continue would we? another good question!

"Never compromise, not even in the face of
Armageddon"

~Rorschach~

"Watchmen"

And still, everyone goes about their pitiful little lives as
if all this is somehow tolerable, or normal; as if they don't feel at the core
of their souls that things aren't supposed to be this way. We don't dare acknowledge to ourselves that a
better way to live exists, because if we did it would drive us to the peak of
insanity.

Last week I was watching the evening news just to see how horrible
to feel, and after the usual nonsensical crap, they began talking about a world
war 2 veteran dying in a video tape at a nursing home. I couldn't believe my eyes, watching the dying
mans nurse in the same room turn her back and ignored him as he
begged for air. The worst part of this
story wasn't the cruelty of the nurse or the death of the Veteran, it was the
fact that this was the human interest
story at the end of the newscast!
This year we have enough Welt Schmerz to go around, plenty for
everyone.

Wednesday, October 25, 2017

I had this dream the other night, which began normally
enough I suppose. I was in a nightclub
sitting at a table, waiting for George
Carlin to come onstage for a show. I
saw him once in Seattle, so again,
normal enough.

With a few minutes to go I was joined by my late friend Mike
who was also an avid Carlin fan. We sure
saw a lot of Grateful Dead shows
together, so everything still felt pretty normal. He grinned that big toothy grin of his,
saying "It figures I'd find you here."

We had just finished ordering drinks when we are joined
unexpectedly by another late friend, Daniel, who remarked about how good I was
looking. You could say I was starting to
see a pattern emerging when a third recently departed friend; Victor grabbed
the remaining chair. He looks at me with those smiling eyes of his and says,
"I wasn't sure you'd make it for the
show..." and with that the curtain goes up, the footlights come on and
George Carlin saunters onto a stage made to look like a courtroom for his one
night only performance of "The Case Against Trump."

As much as I would dearly love to see that performance, I'm not so eager to fulfill the
prerequisite for attendance, so I can only hope there is Netflix in the
hereafter. Of course when I woke up,
Carlin's wit and wisdom were not among the memories of the dream, just seeing
my friends again was enough as I was able to tell them all how good it was to
see them again. The dream was a kindness
from my subconscious, a kind of reprieve from the increasing restlessness and chaos
now surging across the country.

In a
recent post I wrote about the condition known as PTSD: Post Traumatic
Stress Disorder and how it isn't just for combat veterans anymore. Survivors of the California
wildfires and Las Vegas sniper have
it, as do survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault and those who survive
childhood horrors. Basically any experienced traumatic event can
leave behind a list of symptoms not to be envied. Survivors of trauma also very often acquire a type of PTSD called survivor guilt. We recently saw a great deal of this kind after the wildfires; where entire neighborhoods burned, but only on one side of a street...leaving some homes undamaged with neighbors reduced to ash. Many who survived the fires whole and intact are now dealing with the unjustified and illogical guilt over having survived. The same applies to survivors of the Las Vegas sniper who lived while those right next to them were cut down, there's a ton of survivor guilt there as well, and the list goes on and on.

The symptoms can vary depending on
the person and the endured trauma; basically the longer the trauma continued,
the more severe the symptoms of PTSD will
be. Those affected will have strong
aversions to sudden loud noises, and large crowds of people. They become hyper-vigilant and hyper-alert;
needing to know the exact source of unknown sounds or noises. There are invariably sleep disorders and full
scale nightmares. Any sound, smell, or
grouping of specific words can trigger the symptoms. It becomes all about the fear of the
unknown. The fear of what will happen
next.

America
has PTSD, President Trump Stress Disorder and it gets worse every day he
remains in power. The explanations
offered to 'explain' Trump's erratic
and troubling words, tweets &
behavior are actually put forth for another, darker reason: to conceal his dessert tray of mental disorders. Every day that passes brings us all closer to
the inevitable showdown resulting in Trumps impeachment, or removal under the
auspices of the 25th amendment.

Duty to Warn

Beneath the 24-7 Trump news cycle of absurdity there exists
the fact that Donald Trump has a rather nasty collection of mental disorders;
which accredited psychologists around the country are now openly discussing in public
for those who have eyes to read and ears to hear, that is if you aren't inside
a 'news bubble' of your own design.

Psychologist Dr. John Gartner is the founder for a
governmental watchdog group called Duty
to Warn whose objective is to get Trump removed from power in accordance
with the 25th amendment to the US
constitution; which lays out the groundwork and pre-requisites for removing a
president who is proven to be mentally
incapable of performing the job of our president.

Trump favors Twitter for communications because with his
mental disorders; complete, understandable sentences are not required. Just an impulse. Twitter also appeals to his hyperplasic ego
which cannot seem to ever get enough praise: even if it has to come from
him. Perhaps this is why he gets a daily
briefing of positive press stories & video about him from his staff, to
placate him. This is what Senator Bob
Corker meant last week when he said. "The
white house has been relegated to being an adult day care center."

Do you remember listening to President Obama delivering a
speech? I recall how he frequently would
pause briefly in mid-sentence: I like a president who considers the impact his
words may have, before he speaks them.
Not Trump. With him we just get
the unfiltered gibberish as it passes through his brain.

Trump has proven
repeatedly that he has no regard whatsoever for the feelings of others, like
when he referred to slain soldier Sgt. La David Johnson as "Your
guy" during a condolence call to his grieving widow. Any sane, decent man would admit his errors
and apologize. Not Trump; he not only
denies ever saying that, he then engaged in a twitter feud with the widow, and congresswoman Frederick
Wilson who heard the call in question.

How convenient is it that the white house now says there is
no transcript or recording of that condolence call? Trump has a long established record of
denying facts which are there for all to see and hear, starting with his
inauguration crowd size. He has also
proven himself to be a pathological liar in almost every single thing he says.

Trump takes credit for things that were a done deal before he ever ran for office,
like keeping jobs at a car plant, and releasing the classified files on the JFK assassination. Trump blatantly claims the glory for things
he never touched or had anything to do with; like last week when he claimed ISIS was surrendering because he is president! Theater of the absurd. When faced, and challenged with the true facts in such cases, Trump
doubles down on his own stupidity, insists he is right, then viciously
attacks. His behavior is childish in
basic nature, and is only being tolerated because Putin bought our election
last year.

Sugar, Coffee, Tobacco & Bananas

A full month after Puerto Rico was totally wiped off the map
by hurricane Maria on September 20th*, and Trump still
won't sign the waiver allowing non-military ships to deliver goods to the
island, which exponentially increases the amount of life-giving aid already
rotting away in warehouses waiting for someone somewhere to give a fuck. Meanwhile, the repair contract for $300 million dollars to restore all
electric services to the entire island was awarded to a Montana company named Whitefish Energy; a company with just
two (2) employees. Smells like rotten
bananas to me.

There is a reason why Trump and his republican businessmen
henchmen are doing nothing about the disaster in Puerto Rico
and it can be found by even the most casual glance thru the pages of
history. Puerto Rico
was the last Spanish outpost for their colonization of the Americas,
that is until in 1898 when the Americans invaded the island during the
Spanish-American war, and just kept it. American businessmen saw the perfect
climate for agriculture with a self replicating workforce of the poverty
stricken; and wasted very little time in dividing the island up amongst
themselves.

In 1917 all island
residents became United States
citizens upon passing of The Jones Act,
which also ironically forbade any non-us government ships from delivering food
and goods to the island. This bill is
why Trump claims he cannot save the island. All he has to do is sign a temporary waiver
for disaster relief. He loves those
photo ops of him signing new executive orders; but not this time. He'll have none of that! He has repeatedly refused to sign a
waiver. It's almost like he derives some
perverse pleasure in knowing
he is keeping life saving aid from that devastated island.

By 1930 industry and commerce had dropped and the island
became less and less profitable for U.S.
businesses. Then on Sept 27th* 1932
Puerto Rico was devastated by hurricane San
Ciprein; killing over 300 and causing 900 million in damage in todays
dollars. * (2 Category 5 Hurricanes 85 years apart
to the week.) The American
government ended up shelling out a small fortune to rebuild after the hurricane,
a debt they passed on to the government and citizens of the UScommonwealth of Puerto
Rico, a debt they can never repay, by design and
intent.

Puerto Rico became our very own Banana Republic, and home to thousands
of ex-pat American citizens as well. We
still don't have an accurate death toll from Puerto Rico,
or even a date for when those supplies are to be delivered. Now that history has repeated itself, Trump & associates don't want it to repeat again,
so they're taking a pass on the rebuilding this time. Eventually it will be bulldozed over and
become something else once the land is bought at prices rivaling outright
theft.

How do we go about treating a nation with President Trump Stress Disorder? What can be done about lessening its effects? A good start might be a group of politicians
showing enough spine to confront emperor Trump the first. Remove now, replace later.

The trouble is we are in a race against time. With unwanted legal action pending on everything including Russian collusion; the
chances increase for Trump doing something horrific to divert world attention
from his legal future. Why should he
worry about the effect of his inflammatory remarks when he has a nuke proof
bomb shelter to ride it out in?

When you corner someone with PTSD,
or inundate them with more chaos than they can process, they often fight back
by lashing out, sometimes violently. Sometimes
they just have a total emotional breakdown and go a bit berserk. As more and more American citizens succumb to
the symptoms of having PTSD, the more we
may see such random acts of violence.
Was it President Trump Stress
Disorder that sent the Las Vegas
sniper over the edge. How about the Florida
man police caught with an arsenal similar to the Vegas sniper's
collection? Or the Florida
serial killer terrorizing Tampa. Do
they also have President Trump Stress
Disorder,
andwhat is it about Florida??

"I rise to
say...ENOUGH!"

There is no doubt about it, America has President Trump Stress
Disorder, and to see it you have to look no further than the US
senate. On Tuesday Arizona Senator Jeff Flake took the floor to speak to
the Senate about Trump. He said "I
rise to say...ENOUGH..." Calling
Trump "Undignified, reckless and outrageous. The republican senator announced he would not
seek re-election; citing among other things Trump's "personal attacks, threats against
our principals, freedoms and institutions. He emphasized "Trump's flagrant disregard for
the truth," and even the most basic decency. Flake went on about "The
reckless provocations, most often for the pettiest and most personal of reasons. To his peers, Flake added a warning, that
"their silence would equal complicity." [full video below]

"People like to say that the
conflict is between good and evil

when the real conflict is
between truth and lies."

~ Don Miguel Luis~

Senator Bob Corker
who said last week that the white house was "little more than an adult day
care center" smelled the blood in the water and renewed his attack
Tuesday, calling Trump "An utterly un-truthful president." Senators Flake and Corker are spearheading a
growing cadre of republicans to throw the gauntlet down on Trump. Blood in the water, feeding time in the
swamp.

Is this the beginning of the end for Trump; perhaps setting
the ground work and mood to enact the 25th amendment to have him de-throned due
to mental incapacity? We can only hope for
that or full-on impeachment: whatever process removes him from power the
quickest...the 25th amendment, Impeachment, or (using his own words)
"those 2nd amendment folks.

Bill O'Reilly and Harvey Weinstein were each forced out of
their careers after multiple accusations of sexual harassment: but Trump with
his list of 15 such accusations gets to play president. Yeah, that'll give a country some President Trump Stress Disorder, and
most likely some anger as well. Too much
raw input, too much planned chaos; all happening at a time when most Americans
are more afraid of their government than terrorism.

Yes, America
has a rousing case of President Trump
Stress Disorder, and if we do not remove him from office like cutting out a
malignant growth; it will soon spread across the planet like Fukushima
fallout. Other countries with whom America
has always had good relations are now looking elsewhere for leadership and
respect. Those dominoes will continue to
fall as long as the malignant growth remains in power.

So now my Vietnam PTSD
has President Trump Stress Disorder,
like a pet from hell. They romp around
together playing merry hob with my head and dreams, but that's OK because no
matter how much more insane things get, before the insane emperor is removed
from office; I hold firm in the belief that when I'm done here, George Carlin
will be doing his Case Against Trump
show, and Mike will have tickets waiting at the will call window.

Friday, October 13, 2017

I was awakened abruptly last Monday morning by the frantic
ringing of my doorbell. It was my friend
& neighbor Ivan rousing me to 'answer the bell' so to speak; I could already
smell the smoke before he told me there
was a raging firestorm just ten miles away. I live in wine
country, Sonoma county where
much of the terrain is heavily wooded canyons, many peppered with residential
neighborhoods; so dealing with a potential wild fire is always in the back of our minds.
Now it was foremost on our minds.

Little did I know that the day I was waking into would see the
worst firestorm in California
history. Beginning just before midnight on Oct. 8th, fires sprang up in several
different Sonoma and Napa
county locations. The weather was zero
humidity, no moisture in the air,
with winds gusting 50 to 60 mph. Before
Daybreak there were a total of 14 fires racing primarily north, and
eastward, away from my hillside canyon home...for now.

Wildfires such as this actually create their own
weather. As the flames grow higher into
the air it creates a vortex, a sort of fire
tornado which in turn draws in all the air around it. Add to this devil's mix a 50 mph easterly
wind and you get a self feeding, self sustaining firestorm with a halo of
burning airborne embers falling to earth setting new fires, which then join
with the parent fire. Maybe a case could
be made for fire being a kind of life form: It breathes air, consumes food
which strengthens it, and it reproduces itself. Fire spirits, Hmmm. More on
this in a bit.

You don't have to be a prepper to be ready ahead of time for
such natural disasters; all it takes is having been a boy scout, and later a
combat veteran, to see the sense in being ready to bug out with a Go-Bag full of emergency survival needs
already to load in the car. If you don't
have them pre-packed and ready to load in the car, you won't have time
when you are watching the flames advance on your home as floating embers ignite
your roof.

Watching three hurricanes in a row wreck death and devastation
on parts of the country should have motivated a lot of people to prepare,
including making detailed evacuation plans for the family. It sure motivated me to drag my go-bags out
and double check them in the days before the firestorm.

Brewing up some coffee was the first order of business, and
as it was perking away, the second was to check communications status. Had electricity but not much more. No television, no internet, no text. All gone, and
with no word on for how long. Time
to dig out the hand crank, portable emergency radio. I hooked it up and before long found what I
was looking for, all day coverage of the firestorm in my back yard.

"We
face the potential for this kind of firestorm every year,

and
we've been lucky for a long time. Our
luck just ran out."

~Cal-Fire Official

It's kind of funny, the difference in perspective you have
when packing a bug out bag in the calm before the storm; and re-packing it when
faced with the possibility of everything you own turned to ash. With no immediate threat to my residence it
gave me the luxury of doing a kind of triage on my go bags. There is no way you can take everything which
is special to you, so hard choices must be made. Sometimes the practical gives way to the emotional as some things are removed from the bags to make room for something
of a more emotional value.

When you walk thru your home with the idea it might all burn
you begin to see with new eyes. As long
as the wind is our friend and blowing the fire away from us this hopefully
becomes just a dress rehearsal this time.

So as I listened to the reports flowing in on the radio, I
found I couldn't sit still, I had to be doing something even if it was pacing about trying to think of the next
thing I forgot to pack. Hearing odd
noises I quickly checked outside to see what was up. It was my 70 year old next door neighbor, up
on his roof with a rake and water hose, courting a broken leg if he fell.

It occurred to me I was darting around like a ferret chasing
a meal it can't see. I sat and thought
about that a moment and then it dawned on me, PTSD awakes from it's
slumber, given enough stressors. I'm
sitting in a bone dry old house on a wooded hillside in a firestorm, and no
information save for the radio which was mostly helpful but not terribly useful. I'm hearing about places I liked going to,
burned to the ground, along with area landmarks like the Hilton hotel. Entire
subdivisions are going up in flames. People are dying out there in my back
yard.

"The World Has Changed"

~SonomaCounty Sheriff

With no internet
access all; transactions were cash only, and the roadways were choked with
evacuees and those seeking emergency supplies.
I am suddenly feeling pretty smart for having bought two flats of
Aquafina bottled water last week. You
could say a hurricane inspired me to prepare for a firestorm. My friend Ivan has the day off work due to
the firestorm so we spend it pre-loading stuff into the car, just in case. Tomorrow I'm buying a chain saw because no
damned down tree is gonna prevent me from bugging out if the need arises. Boy scout, gotta be prepared!

People are calling reports into the radio station all day,
one man reporting that eight water trucks showed up, without water in their
tanks. Maybe it's a cost effectiveness
thing, why haul all that water any farther than you have to? Intended to fill up at a local hydrant?? Another man called in saying there were no
Cal-Fire aircraft working in his area.
He didn't understand they have to be able to see where to drop
their load of fire retardant.

Day
2~October 10

Day two sees the
number of uncontrolled fires at 17, with 20 dead and over 1500 structures
destroyed. Nobody was prepared for how
fast the flames raced over the land, it's like some kind of surrealistic
nightmare. I am stressed and frustrated
that all data lines are down, except for my wonderful radio. I'm just feeling a need to see this monster on satellite view, so I
can properly engage it. I spent several
years on radio in Alaska, so I
know well the idea of words painting pictures, and the scenes coming from my
emergency disaster radio are horrific.

Smoke from the firestorm can be smelled at San
Francisco airport 60 miles distant. It covers more than 115 thousand acres of
land, over 65 square miles, in eight counties!

There are now more than 4400 firefighters working over
40 hours straight. Twenty
thousand people have been evacuated to shelters, churches & high schools as just dealing with the
displaced becomes a storm itself. The
early estimate of 180 missing people has now become 660 missing people, a
number certain to keep rising. The
firestorm remains at zero containment.
And it is still growing.

"It
looks like a war zone, without the bomb craters"

~TV news reporter

Firemen and first responders are often "lost"
and not knowing exactly where they are because all the street signs melted. Steel melts at 2500 degrees Fahrenheit. Some cars exploded when their gas tanks
ignited, leaving charred upside down slag heaps, each with puddles of melted
aluminum beneath them.

Human nature sure
comes out fast at times like these, there have been very few incidents of
looting so far, but volunteers by the hundreds are calling local officials
wanting to help. I've heard of three
'hubs' where volunteers can go to register &
then be dispatched somewhere to render aid.

I like that. Shows
that hope maybe has a fighting chance after all.

Late afternoon I get the sweet sound of a text notification
from my cell phone. Minutes later internet was restored, and an hour later TV
service came back. I was quite pleasantly
surprised; anticipating a much longer outage lasting several days.

"The firestorm turned our neighborhood into a
sea of nothing"

~Unknown Evacuee

Seeing the images of this monster firestorm came with a case
of cognitive dissonance at the sheer size of the thing, and how incredibly fast
it was consuming everything in its path.
If the recent string of hurricanes was a wake up call, this then was
indeed waking up to a nightmare literally on my back door. The same conditions that birthed this inferno
exist in the canyon I reside in. It
would only take a spark, and I could be among the homeless victims of this
wildfire.

Aerial views of the devastation are truly like something
from a war zone, specifically Hiroshima
after the bombing. Watching these images
as I fine tuned my evacuation luggage, was just feeding my awakened PTSD; it never really goes away, hibernation is
the best you can hope for. The good part
of it is that the awakening PTSD also
brushes off the skill-set needed to deal with the stressors, and the
emergency. They never go away
either. As I move through the house; I
take the time to bless, thank &
release a lifetime worth of possessions I have managed to hold onto until
now. Some things are more difficult to
let go of than others. There is a reason
they're called possessions.

Day
3~October 11

By Wednesday the 11th, the firestorm is now 22
separate fires and has become twice
the size of WashingtonDC and continues to grow, it's appetite unabated. Throughout the devastated area only chimneys
remain standing, like gravestones marking where over 2000 homes died. They say the winds are going to pick up again
tonight.

"This
is a critical, catastrophic event, and

things
will get worse before they get better"

~Cal-Fire Spokesman

Late in the afternoon authorities announce the mandatory
evacuation of Calistoga as the fire marched over the hillside overlooking the
tourist town, and the rolling smoke moved into the valley like a massive
ghost. A pocket fire sprang up near Geyserville
causing even more evacuations, eating still more land.

There are now over 8000 exhausted firemen (Heroes) battling the firestorm
and saving lives. More than 30,000
people have been evacuated and there are 3500 homes and businesses burned to
the ground. There have been 0ver 50
helicopter rescues, as the state amasses the largest aerial bombing campaign in
American history to fight the firestorm.
They have 73 helicopters, 30 air tankers; including a DC-10 and a brand
new 747 jumbo tanker being used for the first time.

As darkness comes to day three there are 26 known dead, and
some 700 missing with over 265 square miles burned; and 80 cell towers destroyed. In their evening press conference authorities
stress that people should avoid the evacuated zones or face arrest. They also advise that this emergency event is
far from over, saying it could be two weeks or longer to get containment &
control over the inferno.

Fire Spirits?

Many years back during the practice burning of an old
dilapidated building in Nixa Missouri; one of the firefighters took a snapshot of the blaze and
was astounded to clearly see what many say is an Indian chief on
horseback. I've been intrigued by such
fire images ever since, and was quite surprised to see one show up in the
growing collection of images from this firestorm event. Look closely at pictures of raging fires, you
may find some yourself.

Day
4~October 12

What caused the firestorm?

Daybreak on day 4 came after an overnight respite as the
winds did not pick up as feared they would.
Even though, it continued to consume thru the night while the air armada
was grounded. It is now thought that
downed power lines and blown transformers started the wildfires around 11:45 pm, last Sunday night. There is also some lingering doubt surrounding the strangeness of 14 fires all starting at more or less the same time. Some of course are thinking this is a new kind of terror attack; while others speak in terms of meteorites being the cause. The Realistic Observer Blog has posted that Illegal Mexican marijuana cartels set the fires in retaliation for recent busts. Much of the areas burned are where legal medical marijuana clubs grow their legal pot. As with so many things these days, we may never learn the whole, complete truth.

There were over 1000 people missing, of them 485 have been
located alive. So far the firestorm has
destroyed 2834 private residences and killed 30 people. Ironically there is a movie due to be
released on October 20th called "Only
the Brave" which is an action yarn about "Smoke Eaters"
otherwise known as firefighters. Not
wanting to disrespect the real life heroes fighting this inferno, but maybe
they could push back the release date for this whole area, it might be too much
too soon for those who have lost homes and entire families. Just sayin, A little compassion goes a long way.

Tonight I am grateful for having a place to live and food to
eat, and yet this event has already affected my future. I've been trying to find another place to
live, closer to town and wheelchair accessible to things I'm interested in
doing for two years now and I've learned one thing for sure and that is the
housing market is depressed. There has
been a drop-off in new construction.
There is a severe shortage of family residential housing and apartments
throughout the region; and way too many people looking to buy or rent. Those numbers just got mega-skewed for maybe a
decade or more with almost 3000 homes destroyed so far. Not only that, but I
can almost feel my rent increasing as I write this. Leverage and taking advantage; purely human traits.

My PTSD is getting a
case of disaster fatigue; not sure how much more I can handle. We're 226 days into the disaster called the Trump inauguration, and the hits
just keep on coming faster than we can process.
Soon psychic numbing sets in with the first symptoms of PTSD, as you become hyper alert to your
surroundings, & do threat assessments
on every new sound or noise. Welcome to
my nightmare.

Whether or not you get help or rescue in the next disaster
depends entirely upon whether you voted for Trump. If you voted blue or are a banana republic,
know that you'll be on your own once you catch your allotment of paper towels.

It is always a wise precaution to have a few crucial items
kept in the trunk of your car: such as a few gallons of water, some canned
food, blankets & clothes etc. and
some basic tools. Add a small chain saw
if you face the possibility of fallen trees across critical escape roadways. I always keep a tent, rope, duct tape & giant green poly tarp in my trunk as
well, because I don't like roughing it. You
should already have a Thomas guide book of the
entire roadway system in your state or area.
If not, perhaps you should consider getting one because knowing where to
go and how to get there can literally save your bacon.

Stored somewhere like an entry closet you should also have
your "Bug-Out-Bag"
pre-packed, loaded and ready to go at a moments notice. The question arises, what to include? First &
foremost are all needed medications, reading glasses, money and your important
personal/family papers. Next, backup
important computer files & documents
to a mass storage device like 64GB flash
drive. You will want to pack headlamps, flashlights,
[with xtra
batteries] - candles and perhaps even a small alpine single burner
camp stove for cooking. That's the thing
about mass evacuations; you have no idea where you will end up, or if you'll
ever see your home again, so the ability to cook might be a game changer.

You will want some spare clothing, how much depends on how
high maintenance you are I suppose. At
some point extra space in your Go Bag becomes very valuable indeed,
so you'll know if you packed too many clothes.
Ideally you should limit your bug out luggage to what you'd feel
comfortable carrying, on foot, over unknown terrain conditions. Assume the worst case scenario, everything
less will seem like good luck.

"Chance Favors Only the Prepared Mind"

~Louis Pasteur~

Next include a decent first aid kit, and a multi-power
source emergency radio. Be sure to pack
cell phone chargers, and extra batteries or power bank devices. It should be a no-brainer but if you own
firearms, pack them as well. Not that
you're gonna be going road warrior, you just don't wanna leave them for
looters. Plus you may need a little Mad Max now &
then. You'll need a supply of breathing
respirators: 3M makes their N95 which is rated to defeat the smallest particles
of smoke, its the mask you want, period.

People aren't all the same and neither are bug out bags,
yours will eventually contain the items you deem crucial to have in a very
uncertain future following some unknown disaster. It's a work in progress, start today.

Got children? They each get their own bug out bag as
well. A few clothes & a lot of toys/games to hold their
attention and give a semblance of normal even in crisis. Fail to do this; and risk being taken to the
limits of parental sanity. For child
mood emergencies, have a couple of Hershey
bars tucked away for emotional bribery.
Works every time!

Watch the news footage of any disaster and you'll see
literally hundreds of refugees carrying plastic garbage bags and pillow cases
holding their worldly possessions. Every
one of them thought there would be time to pack. Sometimes...there just isn't.

Officials with Cal-Fire are saying this is nowhere
near under control, and that it could be weeks before the fire is
out.

When overnight winds picked up early Saturday; a new round
of mandatory evacuations was ordered for Lake
county, Sonoma, and east Santa Rosa
as fires continued to march east and south.
Hours after sunrise the winds continue to be a problem, even though they
helped dissipate some of the smoke
pollution.

An additional 20 helicopters have joined the air armada, and
over a hundred fire trucks and tankers.
over 11000 firefighters are working 24 on/24 off shifts as containment
on two of the largest fires is now over 40% on each.

There are over 600 national guardsmen, and an unknown number
of prison firefighters adding to the manpower on the ground. Many of these firemen are local to this area,
and have lost their own homes
while tirelessly working insane hours to save others and their homes from
destruction.

The air quality remains listed as unhealthy in most of the
affected counties as our evening sunsets take on an eerily beautiful appeal as
seen through the haze from the smoke. If
you start having slight headaches, wheezing, or heavy coughing; you may need to
be using a respirator mask. Long term
inhalation of smoke particles can have some bad effects, especially with
existing breathing issues.

Imagine that fire took your
home and all your possessions. You lost all your ID in the chaos, don't know
how to get your mail, or where you're going to sleep tonight. Imagine being in a shelter, not knowing where
other family members are. Wondering if
you even still have a job to go to. Even
worse; all important personal &
family papers are now ash. Take all that and multiply it by 6000, the number of people
who just lost their entire home.

Over 100,000 people have now been
evacuated

as the official death toll reaches 40 today;

Making
this the largest and most deadly wildfire in state history.

There are still a few reports of lootings and arrests. When
approached while going thru the wreckage of his home, one man drew a pistol. Elsewhere there are many reports in the local
news of people encountering angry, belligerent and generally edgy people
while gathering food and necessary supplies. We must strive to remember that in
times such as these some will bloom while others wither. Not everyone has the coping skills needed for
when your whole life just goes up in smoke.
A good time to be extra polite to everyone.

Most natural disasters like earthquakes, tornadoes and
hurricanes smack you a good one then it's over.
Wildfires are different, and can defy even the most stalwart resistance
as they just keep burning everything in
their way without a shred of mercy. One
couple tried to survive in the middle of a neighbors swimming pool, with the wife dying in her husbands arms, People everywhere are disaster
weary after three deadly hurricanes, then the Vegas sniper. Not a good time to be wondering if your
neighborhood will be the next to disappear in smoke. The visual scars from this disaster will be
with us for quite a while and recovery will be slow, too much so for the
majority I suspect. We silently brace
ourselves because we know the death count will not stay at just 40 souls lost, not
with many hundreds still missing, unaccounted for.

"Santa
Rosa Strong"

Driving thru the affected parts of Santa
Rosa it looks to many like an alien landscape, devoid
of the familiar landmarks. Everywhere
from fences to overpass bridges the emotion of the people pours out in handmade
signs of gratitude to the firemen, first responders and Sheriff's
department. We keep hearing that
recovery will take at least ten years. Meanwhile
the fires continue to burn, causing new evacuations on day number nine of the
firestorm. It's not over, not even close.

We got hit hard.

We are down, but not out.

Thursday ~ Day 11

As the setting sun disappears on day eleven of the northern California
wildfires, everywhere there is the ominous sense of having turned the corner. The only good news is that it will rain
overnight; between 1/4 and 1/2 inch as a small class one weather event passes
from north to south. This is going to be
a sprinkle, when what we need is a deluge.
It'll be just enough to give us some ash runoff to deal with along with
everything else.

Currently there remain just 9 large fires which are from 73%
to 90% contained. Cal-Fire officials say
they expect to have full containment by next Tuesday. That isn't saying the fires will be out by
then, just contained. The official death
toll stands at 42, with 53 still missing; and 11 heroic firemen injured. Over 7000 structures are gone, 6000 of them
were homes, completely destroyed. 15000 are still evacuated.

Today we received much needed help from Montana
as the famous Chief Mountain Hotshots from the Blackfeet Nation arrived
to lend their expertise, as they're considered the marines of firefighting.

As we gradually regain our senses in the aftermath of this
firestorm, local people are starting to ask questions about how the fires really started, and a few
other things which don't quite add up. At
the center of things at the moment,
is the confusing mess surrounding the alleged arrest of an arsonist, and two
agencies battling it out in public. An undocumented homeless man who is known to
local cops was brought in for questioning on a different matter; but isn't a suspect and is not charged with
arson. ICE (Immigration & Customs
Enforcement) officials immediately released a statement condemning
the Sheriffs for endangering the public.
The sheriffs of course responded in kind saying something to the effect
it was bad form to accuse them of that in the middle of everything going on. Not what we want to see from our state and
federal officials!

Then there is the matter of the evacuations that have many
in a furor. Some areas have been cleared
and re-opened for landowners to return to their home sites; but a great many have
not. The number of disgruntled homeless
voices grew until the authorities had to hold a press conference; where when
asked why they cannot return to their homes, angry citizens were told
about a tree that almost injured 3 firemen when it suddenly fell; and the video
clip of that was on all three local network TV
stations. They are not allowing people
back into many areas, and offer only reasons that insult our intelligence.

"We're from the Government, we're
here to help you"

Enter FEMA: The folks
from the Federal Emergency Management Agency
are here, going thru the motions of helping people; from a bureaucratic
perspective. Mostly what they are doing
here is offering (demanding) that ALL those who lost homes go online and
sign up for FEMA to remove all the toxic
stuff from their property, stressing that civilians are not allowed to do that
dangerous job themselves.

Maybe I've been at this too long, but to me that sounds a
whole lot like "you can't go home
until FEMA
cleans up all the evidence."
Once FEMA is finished removing
hazardous materials from the scorched neighborhoods the plan is to bulldoze
them back to bare earth so the rebuilding can begin. There is a fly in this ointment, and it's the
certainty that somebody somewhere has an eye on all that barren smoking
real estate in Sonoma and Napa
counties.